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NORMAN    E.    RICHARDSON,    Eu:ro* 


e    Punishment    of  Children 


BY 

FELIX  ADLER 


THE  ABINGDON  PRESS 

NEW   YORK          CINCINNATI 


EDITORIAL  NOTE 

THE  material  contained  in  this  pamphlet  wa 
originally  delivered  in  three  addresses  before  th 
Ethical  Culture  Society  of  New  York  City.  Specia 
permission  has  been  given  to  have  it  reprinted  ir 
this  form. 

The   ethical   nurture   of  the   child   is    a   distin^  x 
responsibility   which   no   parent    can   neglect   wit  j 
impunity.     When  ignorant  of  the  more  elementar  yl 
principles  of  punishment,  parents  easily  fall  into  ore 
of  two  serious  errors.    The  use  of  harsh  and  severe!* 
arbitrary   methods    causes   the   child's    fine   ethic;] 
sensibilities  to  become  dull.    Through  indifference  o 
careless  neglect,  the  child  becomes  willful,  erratic 
or  self-indulgent.     In  this  study   Dr.   Adler,   wit! 
remarkable  skill,  guides  the  parent  between  the- 
two  extremes.     He  shows  that  it  is  possible  to  b 
consistent  without  being  harsh,  gentle  without  be 
ing  vacillating. 

The  mastery  of  the  art  of  punishment  is  also  on 
of  the  most  direct  means  of  ethical  self-culture 
It  is  to  be  hoped  that  a  careful  study  of  this  sub 
ject  may  result  in  a  refinement  of  the  attitude  c 
parents  toward  each  other,  as  well  as  toward  thei 
children. 

NORMAN  E.  RICHARDSON. 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


First  Edition  Printed  April,  1920 
Reprinted  July,  1920;  March,  19" 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 
I 

IT  is  man's  moral  duty  to  act  as  the  physician  of 
his  enemies  and  seek  to  cure  them  of  their  wrong- 
doing. How  much  more,  then,  should  this  attitude 
be  taken  toward  those  whom  we  love — toward  our 
children,  if  we  find  their  characters  marred  by 
serious  faults? 

In  discussing  the  subject  of  punishment  I  do  not 
for  a  moment  think  of  covering  the  innumerable 
problems  which  it  suggests.  Many  books  have 
been  written  on  this  subject;  prolonged  study  and 
the  experience  of  a  lifetime  are  barely  sufficient 
for  a  mastery  of  its  details.  I  shall  content  myself 
with  suggesting  a  few  simple  rules  and  principles, 
and  shall  consider  my  object  gained  if  I  induce  my 
hearers  to  enter  upon  a  closer  investigation  of  the 
delicate  and  manifold  questions  involved. 

i.  NEVER  ADMINISTER  PUNISHMENT  IN  ANGER 

The  first  general  rule  to  which  I  would  refer  is, 
never  administer  punishment  in  anger.  A  saying 
of  Socrates  deserves  to  be  carefully  borne  in  mind. 
Turning  one  day  upon  his  insolent  servant,  Speucip- 
pus,  who  had  subjected  him  to  great  annoyance, 
he  exclaimed,  "I  should  beat  you  now,  sirrah,  were 
I  not  so  angry  with  you."  The  practice  of  most 
men  is  the  very  opposite;  they  beat  and  punish 
because  they  are  angry. 

But  it  is  clear  that  we  cannot  trust  ourselves 
to  correct  another  while  we  are  enraged.  The  in- 
tensity of  our  anger  is  proportional  to  the  degree 
of  annoyance  which  we  have  experienced,  but  it 
happens  quite  frequently  that  a  great  annoyance 
may  be  caused  by  a  slight  fault,  just  as,  conversely, 


527407 


4    .  '.THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

the' grektesf  fault  may  cause  us  only  slight  annoy- 
ance, or  may  even  contribute  to  our  pleasure.  We 
should  administer  serious  punishment  where  the 
fault  is  serious,  and  slight  punishment  where  the 
fault  is  slight.  But,  as  I  have  just  said,  a  slight 
fault  may  sometimes  cause  serious  annoyance,  just 
as  a  slight  spark  thrown  into  a  powder  magazine 
may  cause  a  destructive  explosion.  And  we  do 
often  resemble  a  powder  magazine,  being  filled 
with  suppressed  inflammable  irritations,  so  that  a 
trivial  naughtiness  on  the  part  of  a  child  may 
cause  a  most  absurd  display  of  temper. 

But  is  it  the  child's  fault  that  we  are  in  this 
irascible  condition?  To  show  how  a  slight  fault 
may  sometimes  cause  a  most  serious  annoyance, 
let  me  remind  you  of  the  story  of  Vedius  Pollio, 
the  Roman.  He  was  one  day  entertaining  the 
Emperor  Augustus  at  dinner.  During  the  ban- 
quet a  slave  who  was  carrying  one  of  the  crystal 
goblets  by  which  his  master  set  great  store,  in  his 
nervousness  suffered  the  goblet  to  fall  from  his 
hand  so  that  it  broke  into  a  thousand  pieces  on 
the  floor.  Pollio  was  so  infuriated  that  he  ordered 
the  slave  to  be  bound  and  thrown  into  a  neighbor- 
ing fishpond,  to  be  devoured  by  the  lampreys. 
The  Emperor  interfered  to  save  the  slave's  life, 
but  Pollio  was  too  much  enraged  to  defer  even  to 
the  Emperor's  wish.  Thereupon  Augustus  ordered 
that  every  crystal  goblet  in  the  house  should  be 
broken  in  his  presence,  that  the  slave  should  be 
set  free,  and  that  the  obnoxious  fishpond  should 
be  closed. 

The  breaking  of  a  goblet  or  vase  is  a  good  instance 
of  how  a  slight  fault,  a  mere  inadvertency,  may 
cause  serious  damage  and  great  chagrin.  In  the 
same  way  an  unseasonable  Word,  loud  conversa- 
tion, a  bit  of  pardonable  mischief,  which  we  should 
overlook  under  ordinary  circumstances,  may  throw 
us  into  a  fury  when  we  are  out  of  sorts.  When 
we  have  urgent  business  and  are  kept  waiting,  we 
are  apt,  unless  we  keep  a  curb  on  our  tempers,  to 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN       $ 

break  forth  into  violent  complaints,  which  indeed 
are  quite  proportional  to  the  amount  of  annoyance 
we  experience,  but  not  necessarily  to  the  fault  of 
the  person  who  occasions  it. 

Our  business  is  to  cure  faults,  and  in  order  to 
accomplish  this  end  the  punishment  should  be 
meted  out  in  due  proportion  to  the  fault.  Instead 
of  following  this  principle,  the  great  majority  of 
men  when  they  punish  are  not  like  reasonable 
beings,  selecting  right  means  toward  a  true  end, 
but  like  hot  springs  which  boil  over  because  they 
cannot  contain  themselves. 

We  ought  never  to  punish  in  anger.  No  one 
can  trust  himself  when  in  that  state;  an  angry  man 
is  always  liable  to  overshoot  the  mark;  we  must 
wait  until  our  angry  feeling  has  had  time  to  cool. 

Do  I  then  advise  that  we  administer  punishment 
in  cold  blood?  No,  we  ought  to  correct  the  faults 
of  others  with  a  certain  moral  warmth  expressed 
in  *our  words  and  manner,  a  warmth  which  is  pro- 
duced by  our  reprehension  of  the  fault,  not  by  the 
annoyance  which  it  causes  us.  This,  then,  is  the 
first  rule:  Never  punish  in  anger. 

2.  DISTINGUISH  BETWEEN  THE  CHILD  AND 
THE  FAULT 

The  second  rule  is  that  in  correcting  a  child  we 
should  be  careful  to  distinguish  between  the  child 
and  its  fault;  we  should  not  allow  the  shadow  of 
the  fault  to  darken  the  whole  nature  of  the  child. 
We  should  treat  the  fault  as  something  accidental 
which  can  be  removed.  Vulgar  persons,  when  a 
child  has  told  a  falsehood,  say,  "You  liar."  They 
identify  the  child  with  the  fault  of  lying,  and  thereby 
imply  that  this  vice  is  ingrained  in  its  nature. 
They  do  not  say  or  imply,  "You  have  told  a  false- 
hood, but  you  will  surely  not  do  so  again;  hereafter 
you  will  tell  the  truth";  they  say,  "You  are  a  liar"; 
which  is  equivalent  to  saying,  "Lying  has  become 
part  and  parcel  of  your  nature."  In  the  same  way 


6       THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

when  a  child  has  proved  itself  incapable  of  master- 
ing a  certain  task,  the  thoughtless  parent  or  teacher 
may  exclaim,  impatiently,  "You  are  a  dunce"; 
that  is  to  say,  "You  are  a  hopeless  case;  nothing 
but  stupidity  is  to  be  expected  of  you."  All  oppro- 
brious epithets  of  this  sort  are  to  be  most  scrupu- 
lously avoided.  Even  to  the  worst  offender  one 
should  say:  "You  have  acted  thus  in  one  case, 
perhaps  in  many  cases,  but  you  can  act  otherwise; 
the  evil  has  not  eaten  into  the  core  of  your  nature. 
There  is  still  a  sound  part  in  you;  there  is  good 
at  the  bottom  of  your  soul,  and  if  you  will  only 
assert  your  better  nature,  you  can  do  well."  We 
are  bound  to  show  confidence  in  the  transgressor. 
Our  confidence  may  be  disappointed  a  hundred 
times,  but  it  must  never  be  wholly  destroyed,  for 
it  is  the  crutch  on  which  the  weak  lean  in  their 
feeble  efforts  to  walk. 

Now,  such  language  as  "You  are  a  dunce," 
"You  are  a  liar,"  is,  to  be  sure,  used  only  by  the 
vulgar;  but  many  parents  who  would  not  use  such 
words  imply  as  much  by  their  attitude  toward 
their  child;  they  indicate  by  their  manner,  "Well, 
nothing  good  is  to  be  expected  of  you."  This  atti- 
tude of  the  parents  is  born  of  selfishness;  the  child 
has  disappointed  their  expectations,  and  the  dis- 
appointment, instead  of  making  them  more  tender 
toward  the  child,  makes  them  impatient.  But 
this  is  not  the  attitude  of  the  physician  whose 
business  it  is  to  cure  evil.  We  must  give  the  child 
to  understand  that  we  still  have  hope  of  his  amend- 
ment; the  slightest  improvement  should  be  welcomed 
with  an  expression  of  satisfaction. 

We  should  never  attach  absolute  blame  to  a 
child,  never  overwhelm  it  with  a  general  condemna- 
tion. And  in  like  manner  we  should  never  give 
absolute  praise,  never  injure  a  child  by  unlimited 
approbation.  The  words,  "excellent,"  "perfect,"  which 
are  sometimes  used  in  school  reports,  are  inexcusable. 
I  have  seen  the  object  of  education  thwarted  in 
the  case  of  particularly  promising  pupils  by  such 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN       7 

unqualified  admiration.  No  human  being  is  ethically 
perfect,  and  to  tell  a  child  that  he  is  perfect  is 
to  encourage  a  superficial  way  of  looking  upon 
life  and  to  pamper  his  conceit. 

The  right  attitude  is  to  say  or  to  imply  by  our 
manner,  "You  have  done  well  thus  far;  go  on  as 
you  have  begun  and  try  hereafter  to  do  still  better." 
Such  words  as  these  fall  like  sunshine  into  the  soul, 
warming  and  fructifying  every  good  seed. 

On  the  other  hand,  to  tell  a  child  that  he  is  per- 
fect may  induce  him  to  relax  his  effort,  for  having 
reached  the  summit  he  does  not  feel  the  need  of 
further  exertion.  We  should  correct  faults  in  such 
a  way  as  to  imply  that  not  everything  is  lost.  And 
we  should  praise  merit  in  such  a  way  as  to  imply 
that  not  everything  is  yet  achieved;  that,  on  the 
contrary,  the  goal  is  still  far,  far  in  the  distance. 

Everything,  as  I  have  said,  depends  upon  the 
attitude  of  the  parent  or  instructor.  Those  who 
possess  educational  tact — a  very  rare  and  precious 
quality — adopt  the  right  attitude  by  a  sort  of 
instinct.  But  those  who  do  not  possess  it  naturally 
can  acquire  it,  at  least  to  a  certain  degree,  by 
reflecting  upon  the  underlying  principles  of  pun- 
ishment. 

3.  Do  NOT  LECTURE  CHILDREN 

The  third  rule  is,  Do  not  lecture  children.  One 
feels  tempted  to  say  to  some  parents:  "You  do 
not  succeed  as  well  as  you  might  in  the  training 
of  your  children  because  you  talk  too  much.  The 
less  you  say  the  more  effective  will  your  discipline 
be.  Let  your  measures  speak  for  you." 

When  punishment  is  necessary  let  it  come  upon 
the  child  like  the  action  of  a  natural  law — calm, 
unswerving,  inevitable.  Do  not  attempt  to  give 
reasons  or  to  argue  with  the  child  concerning  the 
punishment  you  are  about  to  inflict.  If  the  child 
is  in  danger  of  thinking  your  punishment  unjust, 
it  may  be  expedient  to  explain  the  reasons  of  your 


8      THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

action,  but  do  so  after  the  punishment  has  been 
inflicted. 

There  are  parents  who  are  perpetually  scolding 
their  children.  The  fact  that  they  scold  so  much 
is  proof  of  their  educational  helplessness.  They 
do  not  know  what  measures  of  discipline  to  apply, 
hence  they  scold.  Often  their  scolding  is  due  to 
momentary  passion,  and  the  child  intuitively  de- 
tects that  this  is  so.  If  the  parent  is  in  ill  humor, 
a  mischievous  prank,  a  naughty  word,  an  act  of 
disobedience  sometimes  puts  him  into  a  towering 
passion;  at  other  times  the  same  offense  may  be 
lightly  considered,  or  even  worse  offenses  passed 
over  with  meaningless  "Don't  do  that  again." 
The  child  perceives  this  vacillation,  and  learns 
to  look  upon  a  scolding  as  a  mere  passing  shower, 
hiding  its  head  under  shelter  until  the  storm  has 
blown  over. 

Other  parents  are  given  to  delivering  lengthy 
homilies  to  their  children,  and  then  often  express 
surprise  that  all  their  sound  doctrine,  all  their 
beautiful  sermons,  have  no  effect  whatever.  If 
they  would  pause  to  consider  for  a  moment,  they 
could  easily  see  why  their  lectures  have  no  effect, 
why  they  pass  "in  at  one  ear  and  out  at  the  other." 
Their  lectures  on  right  and  wrong  are  generally 
too  abstract  for  the  child's  comprehension,  and 
often  do  not  touch  its  case  at  all.  Moreover,  the 
iteration  of  the  same  dingdong  has  the  effect  of 
blunting  the  child's  apprehension.  A  stern  rebuke 
is  occasionally  necessary  and  does  good,  but  it 
should  be  short,  clear,  incisive. 

A  moralizing  talk  with  an  older  child  sometimes 
does  good.  The  parent  should  not,  however,  in- 
dulge in  generalities,  but,  looking  over  the  record 
of  the  child  for  the  past  weeks  or  months,  should 
pick  out  the  definite  points  in  which  it  has  trans- 
gressed, thus  holding  up  a  picture  of  the  child's 
life  to  its  own  eyes  to  reenforce  the  memory  of  its 
faults  and  stimulate  its  conscience.  In  general, 
it  may  be  said  that  the  less  the  parent  talks  about 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN       9 

moral  delinquencies  the  better.  On  this  rule  of 
parsimony  in  respect  to  words  particular  stress  is 
to  be  laid. 

4.  UNDEVIATING  CONSISTENCY 

The  next  rule  is  quite  as  important  as  the  pre- 
ceding ones.  It  is  that  of  undeviating  consistency. 
Were  not  the  subject  altogether  too  painful,  it  would 
be  amusing  to  observe  how  weak  mothers — and 
weak  fathers  too — constantly  eat  their  own  words. 

"How  often  have  I  told  you  not  to  do  this  thing, 
but  now  you  have  done  it  again."  "Well,  what 
is  to  follow?"  secretly  asks  the  child.  "The  next 
time  you  do  it  I  shall  surely  punish  you."  The 
next  time  the  story  repeats  itself;  and  so  it  is  always 
"the  next  time."  Very  often  foolish  threats  are 
made,  which  the  parents  know  they  cannot  and 
will  not  carry  out;  and  do  you  suppose  that  the 
children  do  not  know  as  well  as  you  that  the  threat 
you  have  been  uttering  is  an  idle  one? 

We  should  be  extremely  careful  in  deciding 
what  to  demand  of  a  child.  Our  demands  should 
be  determined  by  a  scrupulous  regard  for  the  child's 
own  good,  but  when  the  word  has  gone  forth, 
especially  in  the  case  of  young  children,  we  should 
insist  on  unquestioning  obedience.  Our  will  must 
be  recognized  by  the  child  as  its  law;  it  must  not 
suspect  that  we  are  governed  by  passion  or  caprice. 

There  are  those  that  protest  that  this  is  too 
stern  a  method,  that  gentle  treatment,  persuasion, 
and  love  ought  to  suffice  to  induce  the  child  to 
obey.  Love  and  persuasion  do  suffice  in  many 
cases,  but  they  do  not  answer  in  all;  and,  besides, 
I  hold  it  to  be  important  that  the  child  should 
sometimes  be  brought  face  to  face  with  a  law  which 
is  superior  to  the  law  of  its  own  will,  and  should 
be  compelled  to  bend  to  the  higher  law,  as  ex- 
pressed in  its  parent's  wishes,  merely  because  it 
is  a  higher  law. 

And  so  far  from  believing  this  is  to  be  a  cruel 


io     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

method,  I  believe  that  the  opposite  method  of 
always  wheedling  and  coaxing  children  into  obedi- 
ence is  really  cruel.  Many  a  time  later  on  in  life 
its  self-love  will  beat  in  vain  against  the  immutable 
barriers  of  law,  and  if  the  child  has  not  learned  to 
yield  to  rightful  authority  in  youth,  the  necessity 
of  doing  so  later  on  will  only  be  the  more  bitterly 
felt.  The  child  should  sometimes  be  compelled 
to  yield  to  the  parent's  authority  simply  because 
the  parental  authority  expresses  a  higher  law  than 
that  of  its  own  will. 

And  this  leads  me  to  speak  incidentally  of  a  sub- 
ject which  is  nearly  allied  to  the  one  we  are  now 
discussing. 

It  is  a  well-known  trick  of  the  nursery  to  divert 
the  child  from  some  object  which  it  is  not  to  have 
by  quickly  directing  its  attention  to  another  object. 
If  a  child  cries  for  the  moon,  amuse  it  with  the 
light  of  a  candle;  if  it  insists  upon  handling  a  fragile 
vase,  attract  its  attention  to  the  doll;  if  it  demands 
a  knife  with  which  it  might  injure  itself,  call  in  the 
rattle  to  the  rescue. 

This  method  is  quite  proper  for  baby  children, 
but  it  is  often  continued  to  a  much  later  age  with 
harmful  results.  As  soon  as  the  self-consciousness 
of  the  child  is  fairly  developed,  that  is,  about  the 
third  year,  this  method  should  no  longer  be  em- 
ployed. It  is  important  that  the  will  power  of  the 
young  be  strengthened.  Now,  the  more  the  will 
is  accustomed  to  fasten  upon  the  objects  of  desire 
the  stronger  does  it  become,  while,  by  rapidly 
introducing  new  objects  the  will  is  distracted  and 
a  certain  shiftlessness  is  induced,  the  will  being 
made  to  glide  from  one  object  to  another  without 
fixing  itself  definitely  upon  any  one.  It  is  far 
better  to  allow  a  child  to  develop  a  will  of  its  own, 
but  to  make  it  understand  that  it  must  at  times 
yield  this  will  to  the  will  of  the  parent,  than  thus 
to  distract  its  attention.  If  it  wants  a  knife  which 
it  ought  not  to  have,  make  it  understand  firmly, 
though  never  harshly,  that  it  cannot  have  what 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN      n 

it  wants,  that  it  must  yield  its  wish  to  the  parent's 
wish.  Nor  is  it  at  all  necessary  every  time  to  give 
the  reasons  why.  The  fact  that  the  parent  com- 
mands is  a  sufficient  reason. 

The  rules  thus  far  mentioned  are,  that  we  shall 
not  punish  in  anger,  that  we  shall  not  identify  the 
child  with  its  fault,  that  we  shall  be  sparing  with 
admonitions  and  let  positive  discipline  speak  for 
itself,  and  that,  while  demanding  nothing  which 
is  unreasonable,  we  should  insist  on  implicit  obedi- 
ence. 

5.  PHYSICAL  PLEASURE  AS  A  REWARD  OF  VIRTUE 

There  is  one  question  that  touches  the  general 
subject  of  punishment  and  reward  which  is  in  some 
sense  the  most  important  and  vital  of  all  the  ques- 
tions we  are  considering.  It  throws  a  bright  light 
or  a  deep  shadow  on  the  whole  theory  of  life,  ac- 
cording to  the  point  of  view  we  take. 

I  allude  to  the  question  whether  the  pleasures  of 
the  senses  should  be  treated  as  a  reward  for  the 
performance  of  duty.  A  parent  says  to  his  child: 
"You  have  been  good  to-day;  you  have  studied 
your  lessons;  your  deportment  has  been  satisfactory: 
I  will  reward  you  by  giving  you  sweetmeats,  or 
by  taking  you  on  a  holiday  into  the  country." 
But  what  connection  can  there  possibly  be  between 
the  performance  of  duty  and  the  physical  pleasure 
enjoyed  in  eating  sweetmeats?  Is  not  the  con- 
nection a  purely  arbitrary  one?  Does  it  not  de- 
pend upon  the  notion  that  there  is  no  intrinsic 
satisfaction  in  a  moral  act?  We  ought  to  see  that 
it  is  radically  wrong  to  make  such  enjoyments 
the  reward  of  virtue;  we  ought  to  have  the  courage 
to  make  application  of  our  better  theories  to  the 
education  of  our  children  if  we  would  develop  in 
them  the  germs  of  a  nobler,  freer  manhood  and 
womanhood.  I  admit,  indeed,  that  a  child  is  not 
yet  sufficiently  developed  to  stand  on  its  own  feet 
morally,  and  that  its  virtuous  inclinations  need 


12     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

to  be  supported  and  assisted;  but  we  can  give 
it  this  assistance  by  means  of  our  approbation  or 
disapprobation. 

To  be  in  disgrace  with  its  parents  ought  to  be 
for  a  child  the  heaviest  penalty.  To  have  their 
favor  should  be  its  highest  reward.  But  simply 
because  a  child  is  most  easily  taken  on  the  side 
of  its  animal  instincts,  are  we  to  appeal  to  it  on 
that  side?  Should  it  not  be  our  aim  to  raise  the 
young  child  above  the  mere  desire  for  physical 
gratification,  to  prevent  it  from  attaching  too  much 
importance  to  such  pleasures? 

The  conduct  of  many  parents,  however,  I  fear, 
tends  to  foster  artificially  that  lower  nature  in  their 
offspring  which  it  should  rather  be  their  aim  to 
repress.  By  their  method  of  bestowing  extraneous 
rewards,  parents  contribute  to  pervert  the  char- 
acter of  their  children  in  earliest  infancy,  giving 
it  a  wrong  direction  from  the  start. 

But,  it  may  be  objected,  is  there  not  a  whole- 
some truth  contained  in  Saint  Paul's  saying  that 
"he  who  will  not  work,  neither  shall  he  eat"?  Is 
not  our  conscience  offended  when  we  see  a  person 
enjoying  the  pleasures  of  life  who  will  perform 
none  of  its  more  serious  duties?  And  should  we 
not  all  agree  that,  in  a  certain  sense,  virtue  entitles 
one  to  pleasure,  and  the  absence  of  virtue  ought 
to  preclude  one  from  pleasure? 

To  meet  this  point  let  us  dwell  for  a  moment 
on  the  following  considerations.  Man  is  endowed 
with  a  variety  of  faculties,  and  a  different  type 
of  pleasure  or  satisfaction  arises  from  the  exer- 
cise of  each.  Pleasure,  in  general,  may  be  defined 
as  the  feeling  which  results  from  successful  exercise 
of  any  of  our  faculties — physical,  mental  or  moral. 
A  successful  rider  takes  pleasure  in  horsemanship, 
an  athlete  in  the  lifting  of  weights.  The  greater 
an  artist's  mastery  over  his  art,  the  greater  the 
pleasure  he  derives  from  it.  The  more  complex 
and  difficult  the  problems  which  a  scholar  is  able 
to  resolve,  the  more  delight  does  he  find  in  study. 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN      13 

The  same  is  true  of  the  moral  nature.  The  more 
a  man  succeeds  in  harmonizing  his  inner  life,  and 
in  helping  to  make  the  principles  of  social  harmony 
prevail  in  the  world  about  him,  the  more  satis- 
faction will  he  derive  from  the  exercise  of  virtue. 

But  the  main  fact  which  we  are  bound  to  re- 
member is  that  it  is  impossible  to  pay  for  the  exer- 
cise of  any  one  faculty  by  the  pleasure  derived 
from  the  exercise  of  another;  that  each  faculty  is 
legitimately  paid  only  in  its  own  coin.  If  you  ask 
a  horseman  who  has  just  returned  from  an  ex- 
hilarating ride  what  compensation  he  expects  to 
receive  for  the  exercise  he  has  taken,  he  will  prob- 
ably look  at  you  in  blank  amazement,  with  grave 
misgivings  as  to  your  sanity.  If  you  ask  a  scientist 
what  reward  he  expects  to  receive  for  the  pur- 
suit of  knowledge,  he  will  answer  you,  if  he  is  an 
expert  in  the  use  of  his  intellect,  that  he  expects 
no  ulterior  reward  of  any  kind;  that  not  positive 
knowledge  so  much  as  the  sense  of  growth  in  the 
attainment  of  knowledge  is  the  highest  reward 
which  he  can  imagine.  And  the  same  answer  you 
will  get  from  a  person  who  is  expert  in  the  use  of 
his  moral  faculty,  namely,  that  not  virtue  so  much 
as  growth  in  virtue,  not  the  results  achieved  by 
the  exercise  of  the  faculty,  but  the  successful  exer- 
cise itself  is  the  supreme  compensation. 

I  have  used  the  word  "expert"  in  all  these  cases, 
and  precisely  "there's  the  rub."  The  reason  why 
many  persons  cannot  get  themselves  to  believe  that 
the  exercise  of  the  mental  and  moral  faculties  is 
a  sufficient  reward  is  because  they  are  not  expert, 
because  they  have  not  penetrated  far  enough  along 
the  lines  of  knowledge  and  virtue  to  obtain  the 
satisfactions  of  them.  But  the  same  applies  to  the 
tyro  in  any  pursuit.  A  rider  who  has  not  yet  ac- 
quired a  firm  seat  in  the  saddle  will  hardly  derive 
much  pleasure  from  horseback  exercise.  An  awk- 
ward, clumsy  dancer,  who  cannot  keep  step,  will 
get  no  pleasure  from  dancing.  There  is  no  help 
for  the  tyro,  no  matter  in  what  direction  he  aims 


14     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

at  excellence,  except  to  go  on  trying  until  he 
comes  expert. 

I  have  said  that  each  faculty  is  sovereign  in  its 
own  sphere,  that  each  provides  its  proper  satis- 
factions within  itself  and  does  not  borrow  them 
from  the  domain  of  any  of  the  others.  Never- 
theless we  are  constrained  to  admit  the  important 
truth  that  is  contained  in  the  saying  of  Saint  Paul. 
And  this  truth,  it  seems  to  me,  may  be  formulated 
in  the  words  that,  while  physical  pleasure  is  not 
the  reward  of  virtue,  virtue  ought  to  be  regarded 
as  the  condition  sine  qua  non  of  the  enjoyment 
of  physical  pleasures — at  least,  so  far  as  the  dis- 
tribution of  such  pleasures  is  within  the  power  of 
the  educator  or  of  society. 

This  proposition  depends  on  the  difference  in 
rank  that  subsists  between  our  faculties,  of  which 
some  are  superior  and  others  inferior,  the  moral 
and  intellectual  faculties  rightfully  occupying  the 
top  of  the  scale.  We  inwardly  rebel  when  we  see 
the  indolent  and  self-indulgent  living  in  luxury 
and  affluence.  And  this  not  because  the  enjoy- 
ments which  such  persons  command  are  the  proper 
compensations  of  virtue,  or  because  physical  pain 
would  be  the  proper  punishment  of  their  moral 
faults,  but  because  we  demand  that  the  lower 
faculties  shall  not  be  exercised  at  the  expense  and 
to  the  neglect  of  the  higher,  that  the  legitimate 
rank  and  order  of  our  faculties  shall  not  be  subverted. 

Applying  this  idea  to  the  case  of  children,  I  think 
it  would  be  perfectly  proper  to  deny  a  child  that 
has  failed  to  study  its  lessons  or  has  given  other 
occasion  for  serious  displeasure,  the  privilege  of 
going  on  a  holiday  to  the  country  or  enjoying  its 
favorite  sports.  Everything,  however,  will  de- 
pend— as  so  much  in  education  does  depend — on 
the  manner;  in  this  instance  on  what  we  imply  in 
our  denial  rather  than  on  what  we  expressly  state. 

The  denial,  it  seems  to  me,  should  be  made  on 
the  ground  that  there  is  a  proper  order  in  which 
the  faculties  are  to  be  exercised;  that  the  higher, 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN     15 

the  mental,  faculties  should  be  exercised  first,  and 
that  he  who  will  not  aim  at  the  higher  satisfac- 
tions, neither  shall  he,  so  far  as  we  can  prevent, 
enjoy  the  lower.  On  the  other  hand,  by  making 
physical  pleasures — sports,  games  and  the  like — 
the  reward  of  study,  we  exalt  these  satisfactions 
so  as  to  make  them  seem  the  higher,  so  as  to  make 
the  satisfactions  of  knowledge  appear  of  lesser 
value  compared  with  the  satisfactions  of  the  senses. 

In  an  ideal  community  every  one  of  our  faculties 
would  be  brought  into  play  in  turn,  without  our 
ever  being  tempted  to  regard  the  pleasures  of  the 
one  as  compensation  for  the  exercise  of  the  other. 
The  human  soul  has  often  been  compared  to  an 
instrument  with  many  strings.  Perhaps  it  may 
not  be  amiss  to  compare  it  to  an  orchestra.  In 
this  orchestra  the  violins  represent  the  intellectual 
faculties.  They  lead  the  rest.  Then  there  are  the 
flute-notes  of  love,  the  trumpet  tones  of  ambition, 
the  rattling  drums  and  cymbals  of  the  passions  and 
appetites.  Each  of  these  instruments  is  to  come 
in  its  proper  place,  while  the  moral  plan  of  life  is 
the  musical  composition  which  they  all  assist  in 
rendering. 

What  we  should  try  to  banish  is  the  vicious  idea 
of  extraneous  reward,  the  notion  that  man  is  an 
animal  whose  object  in  life  is  to  eat  and  drink, 
to  possess  gold  and  fine  garments,  and  to  gratify 
every  lower  desire,  and  that  he  can  be  brought 
to  labor  only  on  condition  that  he  may  obtain  such 
pleasures.  What  we  should  impress  instead  is  the 
notion  that  labor  itself  is  satisfying — manual  labor, 
mental  labor,  moral  labor — and  that  the  more 
difficult  the  labor,  the  higher  the  compensating 
satisfactions. 


16     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

II 

I  have  thus  far  endeavored  to  combat  the  notion 
that  physical  pleasure  should  be  offered  as  a  re- 
ward for  virtue,  and  physical  pain  inflicted  as  a 
punishment  for  moral  faults.  Now  we  are  in  a 
position  to  apply  this  conclusion  to  some  special 
questions  which  it  is  proposed  to  take  up  for  con- 
sideration. The  first  of  these  relates  to  corporal 
punishment. 

i.  CORPORAL  PUNISHMENT 

It  was  in  that  period  of  history  which  is  so  justly 
called  the  Dark  Ages  that  the  lurid  doctrine  of 
hell  as  a  place  for  the  eternal  bodily  torture  of  the 
wicked  haunted  men's  minds,  and  the  same  mediaeval 
period  witnessed  the  most  horrible  examples  of 
corporal  punishment  in  the  schools  and  in  the 
homes. 

This  was  no  mere  coincidence.  As  the  manners 
of  the  people  are  so  will  their  religion  be.  Savage 
parents  who  treat  their  children  in  a  cruel,  pas- 
sionate way  naturally  entertain  the  idea  of  a  god 
who  treats  his  human  children  in  the  same  way. 
If  we  wish  to  purify  the  religious  beliefs  of  men, 
we  must  first  ameliorate  their  daily  life. 

There  was  once  a  schoolmaster  who  boasted 
that  during  his  long  and  interesting  career  he  had 
inflicted  corporal  punishment  more  than  a  million 
times.  In  modern  days  the  tide  of  public  opinion 
has  set  strongly  against  corporal  punishment.  It 
is  being  abolished  in  many  of  our  public  institutions, 
and  the  majority  of  cultivated  parents  have  a 
decided  feeling  against  availing  themselves  of  this 
method  of  discipline. 

But  the  mere  sentiment  against  it  is  not  sufficient. 
Is  the  opposition  to  it  the  result  possibly  of  that 
increased  sensitiveness  to  pain  which  we  observe 
in  the  modern  man,  of  the  indisposition  to  inflict 
or  to  witness  suffering?  Then  some  stern  teacher 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN      17 

might  tell  us  that  to  inflict  suffering  is  sometimes 
necessary,  that  it  is  a  sign  of  weakness  to  shrink 
from  it,  that  as  the  surgeon  must  sometimes  apply 
the  knife  in  order  to  effect  a  radical  cure,  so  the 
conscientious  parent  should  sometimes  inflict  physi- 
cal pain  in  order  to  eradicate  grievous  faults.  The 
stern  teacher  might  warn  us  against  "sparing  the 
rod  and  spoiling  the  child. " 

We  must  not,  therefore,  base  our  opposition  to 
corporal  punishment  merely  on  sentimental  grounds. 
And  there  is  no  need  for  doing  so,  for  there  are 
sound  principles  on  which  the  argument  may  be 
made  to  rest.  Corporal  punishment  does  not  merely 
conflict  with  our  tenderer  sympathies,  it  thwarts 
and  defeats  the  purpose  of  moral  reformation.  In 
the  first  place  it  brutalizes  the  child;  secondly,  in 
many  cases  it  breaks  the  child's  spirit,  making  it 
a  moral  coward;  and,  thirdly,  it  tends  to  weaken 
the  sense  of  shame,  on  which  the  hope  of  moral 
improvement  depends. 

Corporal  punishment  brutalizes  the  child.  We  may 
be  justified  in  beating  a  brute,  though,  of  course, 
never  in  a  cruel,  merciless  way.  A  lazy  beast  of 
burden  may  be  stirred  up  to  work;  an  obstinate 
mule  must  feel  the  touch  of  the  whip.  Corporal 
punishment  implies  that  a  rational  human  being 
is  on  the  level  of  an  animal.1  Its  underlying  thought 
is:  you  can  be  controlled  only  through  your  ani- 
mal instincts;  you  can  be  moved  only  by  an  appeal 
to  your  bodily  feelings.  It  is  a  practical  denial 
of  that  higher  nature  which  exists  in  every  human 
being,  and  this  is  a  degrading  view  of  human  char- 
acter. A  child  which  is  accustomed  to  be  treated 
like  an  animal  is  apt  to  behave  like  an  animal. 
Thus  corporal  punishment  instead  of  moralizing 
serves  to  demoralize  the  character. 

In  the  next  place  corporal  punishment  often  breaks 

*It  is  an  open  question  whether  light  corporal  punishment  should 
not  occasionally  be  permitted  in  the  case  of  very  young  children  who 
have  not  yet  arrived  at  the  age  of  reason.  In  this  case,  at  all  events, 
there  is  no  danger  that  the  permission  will  be  abused.  No  one 
would  think  of  seriously  hurting  a  very  young  child. 


1 8     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 


the  spirit  of  a  child.  Have  you  ever  observed  how 
some  children  that  have  been  often  whipped  will 
whine  and  beg  off  when  the  angry  parent  is  about 
to  take  out  the  rattan:  "O,  I  will  never  do  it  again; 
O,  let  me  off  this  time."  What  an  abject  sight 
it  is — a  child  fawning  and  entreating  and  groveling 
like  a  dog!  And  must  not  the  parent  too  feel  hu- 
miliated in  such  a  situation!  Courage  is  one  of 
the  noblest  of  the  manly  virtues.  We  should  train 
our  children  to  bear  unavoidable  pain  without 
flinching,  but  sensitive  natures  can  only  be  slowly 
accustomed  to  endure  suffering;  and  chastisement, 
when  it  is  frequent  and  severe,  results  in  making 
a  sensitive  child  more  and  more  cowardly,  more 
and  more  afraid  of  the  blows.  In  such  cases  it  is 
the  parents  themselves,  by  their  barbarous  disci- 
pline, who  stamp  the  ugly  vice  of  cowardice  upon 
their  children. 

Even  more  disastrous  is  the  third  effect  of  cor- 
poral punishment,  that  of  blunting  the  sense  of 
shame.  Some  children  quail  before  a  blow,  but 
others,  of  a  more  obstinate  disposition,  assume  an 
attitude  of  dogged  indifference.  They  hold  out 
the  hand,  they  take  the  stinging  blows,  they  utter 
no  cry,  they  never  wince;  they  will  not  let  the 
teacher  or  father  triumph  over  them  to  that  extent; 
they  walk  off  in  stolid  indifference. 

Now,  a  blow  is  an  invasion  of  personal  liberty. 
Every  one  who  receives  a  blow  feels  a  natural  im- 
pulse to  resent  it.  But  boys  who  are  compelled 
by  those  in  authority  over  them  to  submit  often 
to  such  humiliation  are  liable  to  lose  the  finer 
feeling  for  what  is  humiliating.  They  become,  as 
the  popular  phrase  puts  it,  "hardened."  Their 
sense  of  shame  is  deadened. 

But  sensitiveness  to  shame  is  that  quality  of 
our  nature  on  which,  above  all  others,  moral  progress 
depends.  The  stigma  of  public  disgrace  is  one  of 
the  most  potent  safeguards  of  virtue.  The  world 
cries  "Shame"  upon  the  thief,  and  the  dread  of 
the  disgrace  which  is  implied  in  being  called 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN     19 

thief  acts  as  one  of  the  strongest  preventives  upon 
those  whom  hunger  and  poverty  might  tempt  to 
steal.  The  world  cries  "Shame"  upon  the  law- 
breaker in  general,  but  those  who  in  their  youth 
are  accustomed  to  be  put  to  shame  by  corporal 
punishment  are  likely  to  become  obtuse  to  other 
forms  of  disgrace  as  well.  The  same  criticism 
applies  to  those  means  of  publicly  disgracing  chil- 
dren which  have  been  in  vogue  so  long — the  fool's 
cap,  the  awkward  squad,  the  bad  boy's  bench,  and 
the  like.  When  a  child  finds  itself  frequently  ex- 
posed to  ignominy  it  becomes  indifferent  to  igno- 
miny, and  thus  the  door  is  opened  for  the  entrance 
of  the  worst  vices.  ^ 

There  is  one  excellence,  indeed,  which  I  per- 
ceive in  corporal  punishment;  it  is  an  excellent 
means  of  breeding  criminals.  Parents  who  inflict 
frequent  corporal  punishment,  I  make  bold  to  say, 
are  helping  to  prepare  their  children  for  a  life  of 
crime;  they  put  them  on  a  level  with  the  brute, 
break  their  spirit  and  weaken  their  sense  of  shame. 

2.  THE  EVIL  OF  THE  MARK  SYSTEM 

The  second  special  question  which  we  have  to 
consider  relates  to  the  mark  system.  As  this  sys- 
tem is  applied  to  hundreds  of  thousands  of  school 
children,  the  question  whether  that  influence  is 
good  or  evil  concerns  us  closely.  I  am  of  the  opinion 
that  it  is  evil.  The  true  aim  of  every  school  should 
be  to  lead  the  pupils  to  pursue  knowledge  for  the 
sake  of  knowledge,  and  to  preserve  a  correct  de- 
portment in  order  to  gain  the  approbation  of  con- 
science and  of  the  teacher  whose  judgment  repre- 
sents the  verdict  of  conscience. 

I  object  to  the  mark  system  because  it  introduces 
a  kind  of  outward  payment  for  progress  in  study 
and  good  conduct.  The  marks  which  the  pupil 
receives  stand  for  the  dollars  and  cents  which  the 
man  will  receive  later  on  for  his  work.  So  much 
school  work  performed,  so  many  marks  in  return. 


20     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

But  a  child  should  be  taught  to  study  for  the  pleas- 
ure which  study  gives,  and  for  the  improvement 
of  the  mind  which  is  its  happy  result. 

I  know  of  a  school  where  the  forfeiture  of  twelve 
marks  was  made  the  penalty  for  a  certain  mis- 
demeanor. One  day  a  pupil,  being  detected  in  a 
forbidden  act,  turned  to  the  teacher  and  said, 
"I  agree  to  the  forfeit,  you  can  strike  off  my  twelve 
marks,"  and  then  went  on  openly  transgressing 
the  rule,  as  if  he  had  paid  out  so  many  shillings  for 
an  enjoyment  which  he  was  determined  to  have; 
as  if  the  outward  forfeit  could  atone  for  the  anti- 
moral  spirit  by  which  the  act  was  inspired.  But 
how  is  it  possible  by  any  external  system  of  marks 
to  change  the  antimoral  spirit  of  an  offender? 

I  object,  furthermore,  to  the  marking  system  be- 
cause the  discrimination  to  which  it  leads  can 
never  be  really  just.  One  boy  receives  an  average 
of  ninety-seven  and  one  half  per  cent,  and  another 
of  ninety-five.  The  one  who  receives  ninety-seven" 
and  one  half  thinks  himself  superior  to,  and  is 
ranked  as  the  superior  of  the  one  who  has  received 
only  ninety-five.  But  is  it  possible  to  rate  mental 
and  moral  differences  between  children  in  this 
arithmetical  fashion? 

Above  all,  I  object  to  this  system  because  it 
appeals  to  a  low  spirit  of  competition  among  the 
young  in  order  to  incite  them  to  study.  "Am- 
bition is  avarice  on  stilts,"  as  Landor  puts  it.  Of 
course  it  is  better  to  try  to  outshine  others  in  what 
is  excellent  than  in  what  is  vicious;  but  if  the  ob- 
ject be  that  of  outshining  others  at  all,  of  gaining 
superiority  over  others,  no  matter  how  high  the 
faculties  may  be  which  are  called  into  exercise,  the 
motive  is  impure  and  ought  to  be  condemned. 
There  is  a  general  impression  abroad  that  men  are 
not  yet  good  enough  to  make  it  practicable  to 
appeal  to  their  better  nature.  But  it  is  forgotten 
that  by  constantly  appealing  to  the  baser  impulses 
we  give  these  undue  prominence,  and  starve  out 
and  weaken  the  nobler  instincts.  Whatever 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN      21 

truth  may  be  in  regard  to  later  life,  it  seems  to  me 
culpable  to  foster  this  sort  of  competition  in  young 
children. 

Now,  the  mark  spirit  does  foster  such  a  spirit 
in  our  schools.  It  teaches  the  pupils  to  work  for 
distinction  rather  than  for  the  solid  satisfaction  of 
growth  in  intelligence  and  mental  power.  Doubt- 
less, where  the  method  of  instruction  is  mechan- 
ical, where  the  atmosphere  of  the  classroom  is  dull 
and  lifeless,  and  the  tasks  are  uninteresting,  it  is 
necessary  to  use  artificial  means  in  order  to  keep 
the  pupils  to  their  work;  it  is  necessary  to  give 
them  the  sweet  waters  of  flattered  self-esteem  in 
order  to  induce  them  to  swallow  the  dry-as-dust 
contents  of  a  barren  school  learning. 

But  is  it  not  possible  to  have  schools  in  which 
every  subject  taught  shall  be  made  interesting  to 
the  scholars,  in  which  the  ways  of  knowledge  shall 
become  the  ways  of  pleasantness,  in  which  there 
shall  be  sufficient  variety  in  the  program  of  lessons 
to  keep  the  minds  of  the  pupils  constantly  fresh 
and  vigorous,  in  which  the  pupils  shall  not  be  re- 
warded by  being  dismissed  at  an  earlier  hour  than 
usual  from  the  school,  but  in  which  possibly  they 
shall  consider  it  reward  to  be  allowed  to  remain 
longer  than  usual?  And,  indeed,  requests  of  this 
sort  are  often  made  in  schools  of  the  better  kind, 
and  in  such  schools  there  is  no  need  of  an  artificial 
mark  system,  no  need  to  stimulate  the  unwhole- 
some ambition  of  the  pupils,  no  need  to  bribe  them 
to  perform  their  tasks.  Rather  do  such  pupils  look 
with  affection  upon  their  school;  and  the  daily  task 
itself  is  a  delight  and  a  sufficient  reward. 

I  do  not,  of  course,  oppose  the  giving  of  reports 
to  children.  Such  expressions  as  "good,"  "fair" 
and  "poor,"  which  formulate  the  teacher's  opinion 
of  the  pupil  from  time  to  time,  are  indispensable, 
inasmuch  as  they  acquaint  the  parents  and  the 
pupil  himself  with  the  instructor's  general  approval 
or  disapprobation.  I  only  oppose  the  numerical 
calculation  of  merit  and  demerit,  and  the  vulgar 


22     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 


method  of  determining  the  pupil's  rank  in  the  class 
according  to  percentages.  Under  that  method  the 
pupils,  having  pursued  knowledge  only  as  a  means 
to  the  end  of  satisfying  their  pride  and  vanity, 
relax  their  efforts  when  they  have  gained  this 
ambitious  aim.  They  cease  to  take  any  'deeper 
interest  in  the  pursuit  of  knowledge  the  moment 
they  have  achieved  their  purpose.  The  notorious 
failure  of  the  system,  despite  all  its  artificial  stim- 
ulants, to  create  lasting  attachment  and  devotion 
to  intellectual  pursuits  condemns  the  whole  idea  of 
marks,  to  my  mind,  beyond  appeal. 

3.  "NATURAL  PENALTIES" 

We  pass  next  to  the  method  for  correcting  the 
faults  of  children  which  has  been  proposed  by 
Herbert  Spencer  in  his  collected  essays  on  educa- 
tion. These  essays  have  attracted  great  attention, 
as  anything  would  be  sure  to  do  which  comes  from 
so  distinguished  a  source.  I  have  heard  people 
who  are  ardent  admirers  of  Spencer  say,  "We  base 
the  education  of  our  children  entirely  on  Mr.  Spen- 
cer's book."  All  the  more  necessary  is  it  to  examine 
whether  the  recommendations  of  his  book  will 
wholly  bear  criticism. 

I  cannot  help  feeling  that  if  Mr.  Spencer  had  been 
more  thoroughly  at  home  in  the  best  educational 
literature  he  would  not  have  presented  to  us  an 
old  method  as  if  it  were  new,  and  would  not  have 
described  that  which  is  at  best  but  a  second-  or 
third-rate  help  in  moral  education  as  the  central 
principle  of  it  all,  the  keynote  of  the  whole  theory 
of  the  moral  training  of  the  young. 

The  method  which  he  advises  us  to  adopt  is  that 
of  visiting  upon  the  child  the  natural  penalties  of  its 
transgression,  of  causing  it  to  experience  the  in- 
evitable consequences  of  evil  acts  in  order  that  it 
may  avoid  evil,  of  building  up  the  moral  nature 
of  the  child,  by  leading  it  to  observe  the  outward 
results  of  its  acts.  Mr.  Spencer  points  out  that 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN      23 

when  a  child  puts  its  finger  into  the  flame,  or  when 
it  incautiously  touches  a  hot  stove,  it  is  burned; 
"a  burnt  child  shuns  the  fire."  When  a  child  care- 
lessly handles  a  sharp  knife  it  is  apt  to  cut  its  fin- 
gers. This  is  a  salutary  lesson;  it  will  be  more  care- 
ful thereafter;  this  is  the  method  of  nature,  namely, 
of  teaching  by  experience.  And  this  is  a  kind  of 
cure-all  which  he  offers  for  general  application. 
He  does,  indeed,  admit  at  the  close  of  his  essay, 
that,  in  certain  cases,  where  the  evil  consequences 
are  out  of  ail  proportion  to  the  fault,  some  other 
method  than  that  of  experience  must  be  adopted. 
But,  in  general,  he  recommends  this  method  of  na- 
ture, as  he  calls  it. 

For  instance,  a  child  in  the  nursery  has  littered 
the  floor  with  its  toys,  and  after  finishing  its  play 
refuses  to  put  them  away.  When  next  the  child 
asks  for  its  toy  box  the  reply  of  its  mother  should 
be:  "The  last  time  you  had  your  toys  you  left 
them  lying  on  the  floor  and  Jane  had  to  pick  them 
up.  Jane  is  too  busy  to  pick  up  every  time  the 
things  you  leave  about,  and  I  cannot  do  it  myself, 
so  that,  as  you  will  not  put  away  your  toys  when 
you  have  done  with  them,  I  cannot  let  you  have 
them.'*  This  is  obviously  a  natural  consequence 
and  must  be  so  recognized  by  the  child. 

Or  a  little  girl,  Constance  by  name,  is  scarcely 
ever  ready  in  time  for  the  daily  walk.  The  gov- 
erness and  the  other  children  are  almost  invariably 
compelled  to  wait.  In  the  world  the  penalty  of 
being  behind  time  is  the  loss  of  some  advantage 
that  one  would  otherwise  have  gained.  The  train 
is  gone,  or  the  steamboat  is  just  leaving  its  moor- 
ings, or  the  good  seats  in  the  conceit  room  are 
filled;  and  every  one  may  see  that  it  is  the  pro- 
spective deprivation  entailed  by  being  late  which 
prevents  people  from  being  unpunctual.  Should  not 
this  prospective  deprivation  control  the  child's 
conduct  also?  If  Constance  is  not  ready  at  the 
appointed  time  the  natural  result  should  be  that 
she  is  left  behind  and  loses  her  walk. 


24     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

Or,  again,  a  boy  is  in  the  habit  of  recklessly 
soiling  and  tearing  his  clothes.  He  should  be  com- 
pelled to  clean  them  and  to  mend  the  tear  as  well 
as  he  can.  And  if  having  no  decent  clothes  to 
wear,  the  boy  is  ever  prevented  from  joining  the 
rest  of  the  family  on  a  holiday  excursion  and  the 
like,  it  is  manifest  that  he  will  keenly  feel  the  pun- 
ishment and  perceive  that  his  own  carelessness  is 
the  cause  of  it. 

But  I  think  it  can  easily  be  made  clear  that  this 
method  of  moral  discipline  should  be  an  exceptional 
and  not  a  general  one,  and  that  there  are  not  a 
few  but  many  occasions  when  it  becomes  simply 
impossible  to  visit  upon  children  the  natural  penal- 
ties of  their  transgressions.  In  these  cases  the  evil 
consequences  are  too  great  or  too  remote  for  us 
to  allow  the  child  to  learn  from  experience. 

A  boy  is  leaning  too  far  out  of  the  window;  shall 
we  let  him  take  the  natural  penalty  of  his  folly? 
The  natural  penalty  would  be  to  fall  and  break 
his  neck.  Or  a  child  is  about  to  rush  from  a  heated 
room  into  the  cold  street  with  insufficient  covering; 
shall  we  let  the  child  take  the  natural  penalty  of 
its  heedlessness  ?  The  natural  penalty  might  be 
an  attack  of  pneumonia.  Or,  again,  in  certain  parts 
of  the  country  it  is  imprudent  to  be  out  on  the 
water  after  nightfall  owing  to  the  danger  of  malaria. 
A  boy  who  is  fond  of  rowing  insists  upon  going  out 
in  his  boat  after  dark;  shall  we  allow  him  to  learn 
by  experience  the  evil  consequences  of  his  act  and 
gain  wisdom  by  suffering  the  natural  penalty? 
The  natural  penalty  might  be  that  he  would  come 
home  in  a  violent  fever. 

To  show  how  much  mischief  the  application  of 
the  Spencerian  method  might  work,  let  me  men- 
tion a  case  which  came  under  my  observation.  A 
certain  teacher  had  been  studying  Herbert  Spencer 
and  was  much  impressed  with  his  ideas.  One  wet, 
rainy  day  a  number  of  children  came  to  school 
without  overshoes.  The  teacher  had  often  told 
them  that  they  must  wear  their  overshoes  when 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN     25 

it  rained;  having  neglected  to  do  so,  their  feet  were 
wet.  Now  came  the  application  of  the  natural 
penalty  theory.  Instead  of  keeping  the  children 
near  the  fire  while  their  shoes  were  being  dried  in 
the  kitchen,  they  were  allowed  to  run  about  in 
their  stocking  feet  in  the  large  school  hall  in  order 
to  fix  in  their  minds  the  idea  that,  as  they  had  made 
their  shoes  unfit  to  wear,  they  must  now  go  with- 
out them.  This  was  in  truth  moral  discipline  with 
a  vengeance. 

It  is,  in  many  instances,  impossible  to  let  the 
natural  penalties  of  their  transgressions  fall  upon 
children;  it  would  be  dangerous  to  health,  to  life 
and  limb,  and  also  to  character,  to  do  so. 

Let  me  be  perfectly  understood  just  here:  I  do 
not  deny  that  the  method  of  natural  penalties  is 
capable  of  being  applied  to  advantage  in  the  moral 
training  of  children.  It  is  a  philosophic  conclusion 
that  it  can  be  used  as  a  means  of  building  up  the 
confidence  of  children  in  the  authority  of  their 
parents  and  educators. 

The  father  says  to  his  child:  "You  must  not 
touch  the  stove  or  you  will  be  burned."  The  child 
disobeys  his  command  and  is  burned.  "Did  I  not 
warn  you?"  says  the  father.  "Do  you  not  see  that 
I  was  right?  Hereafter  believe  my  words  and  do 
not  wait  to  test  them  in  your  experience."  The 
comparatively  few  cases  in  which  the  child  may 
without  injury  be  made  to  experience  the  conse- 
quences of  his  acts  should  be  utilized  to  strengthen 
its  belief  in  the  wisdom  and  goodness  of  its  parents, 
so  that  in  an  infinitely  greater  number  of  cases  their 
authority  will  act  upon  the  mind  of  the  child  almost 
as  powerfully  as  the  actual  experience  of  the  evil 
consequences  would  act. 

Mr.  Spencer  himself  admits,  as  I  have  said,  that 
there  are  what  he  calls  extreme  cases  to  which  the 
system  he  recommends  does  not  apply.  In  these 
he  falls  back  upon  parental  displeasure  as  the 
proper  penalty.  But  parental  displeasure,  accord- 
ing to  his  view,  is  an  indirect  and  not  a  direct 


26     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 


penalty,  and  to  use  his  own  words,  "the  error  which 
we  have  been  combating  is  that  of  substituting 
parental  displeasure  for  the  penalties  which  nature 
has  established."  Yet  he  himself  in  regard  to  the 
graver  offenses  does  substitute  parental  displeasure, 
and  thus  abandons  his  own  position. 

There  is,  moreover,  a  second  ground  on  which 
I  would  rest  my  criticism.  The  art  of  the  educator 
sometimes  consists  in  deliberately  warding  of  the 
natural  penalties,  though  the  child  knows  what 
they  are  and  perhaps  expects  to  pay  them.  So 
far  is  the  method  of  Spencer  from  bearing  the  test 
of  application  that  the  very  opposite  of  what  he 
recommends  is  right  in  some  of  the  most  important 
instances. 

Take  the  case  of  lying,  for  instance.  The  natural 
penalty  for  telling  a  falsehood  is  not  to  be  believed 
the  next  time,  but  the  real  secret  of  moral  redemp- 
tion consists  in  not  inflicting  this  penalty.  We 
emphasize  our  belief  in  the  offender  despite  the 
fact  that  he  has  told  a  falsehood,  we  show  that  we 
expect  him  never  to  tell  a  falsehood  again,  we  seek 
to  drive  the  spirit  of  untruthfulness  out  of  him — 
by  believing  in  him  we  strengthen  him  to  overcome 
temptation.  And  so  in  many  other  instances  we 
rescue,  we  redeem,  by  not  inflicting  the  natural 
penalty. 

The  task  of  moral  education  is  laid  upon  us. 
It  is  not  a  task  that  can  be  learned  by  reading  a 
few  scattered  essays;  it  is  often  a  heavy  burden 
and  involves  a  constant  responsibility.  I  know  it 
is  not  right  always  to  make  parents  responsible 
for  the  faults  which  appear  in  their  children.  I  am 
well  aware  that  the  worst  fruit  sometimes  comes 
from  the  best  stock,  and  that  black  sheep  are  some- 
times to  be  found  in  the  best  families.  But  I  can- 
not help  thinking  that  if  these  black  sheep  were 
taken  charge  of  in  the  right  way  in  early  child- 
hood, the  results  might  turn  out  differently  from 
what  they  often  do.  The  picture  of  Jesus  on  which 
the  early  church  loved  to  dwell  is  the  picture  of 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN     27 

the  good  shepherd  who  follows  after  the  lamb 
that  has  strayed  from  the  fold,  and,  carrying  it 
tenderly  in  his  arms,  brings  it  back.  I  think  if 
parents  were  more  faithful  shepherds,  and  cared 
for  their  wayward  children  with  deeper  solicitude 
and  tenderness,  they  might  often  succeed  in  winning 
them  back. 

But  even  apart  from  these  exceptional  cases  the 
task  of  training  children  morally  is  one  of  immense 
gravity  and  difficulty.  And  how  are  most  parents 
prepared  for  the  discharge  of  this  task?  Why, 
they  are  not  at  all  prepared.  They  rely  merely 
upon  impulse,  and  upon  traditions  which  often  are 
altogether  wrong  and  harmful.  They  do  as  they 
have  seen  other  fathers  and  mothers  do,  and  thus 
the  same  mistakes  are  perpetuated  from  genera- 
tion to  generation.  Such  parents,  if  they  were 
asked  to  repair  a  clock,  would  say,  "No,  we  must 
first  learn  about  the  mechanism  of  a  clock  before 
we  undertake  to  repair  it."  But  the  delicate  and 
complex  mechanism  of  a  child's  soul  they  under- 
take to  repair  without  any  adequate  knowledge  of 
the  springs  by  which  it  is  moved,  or  of  the  system 
of  adjustments  by  which  it  is  enabled  to  perform 
its  highest  work.  They  thrust  their  crude  hands 
into  the  mechanism  and  often  damage  or  break  it 
altogether. 

I  do  not  pretend  for  a  moment  that  education 
is  as  yet  a  perfect  science;  I  know  it  is  not.  I  do 
not  pretend  that  it  can  give  us  a  great  deal  of  light; 
but  such  light  as  it  can  give  we  ought  to  be  all  the 
more  anxious  to  obtain  on  account  of  the  prevailing 
darkness.  The  time  will  doubtless  come  when  the 
science  of  education  will  be  acknowledged  to  be, 
in  some  sense,  the  greatest  of  all  the  sciences;  when, 
among  the  benefactors  of  the  race,  the  great  states- 
men, the  great  inventors,  and  even  the  great  re- 
formers will  not  be  ranked  as  high  as  the  great 
educators. 


28     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

III 

In  order  that  a  parent  shall  properly  influence 
a  child's  character,  it  is  necessary  for  him  to  know 
what  that  character  is,  and  what  the  nature  is  of 
each  fault  with  which  he  is  dealing.  I  feel  almost 
like  asking  pardon  for  saying  anything  so  self- 
evident.  It  seems  like  saying  that  a  physician 
who  is  called  to  a  sick-bed,  before  beginning  to 
prescribe,  should  know  the  nature  of  the  disease 
for  which  he  is  prescribing,  should  not  prescribe 
for  one  disease  when  he  is  dealing  with  another. 

I  do  not  know  enough  about  physicians  to  say 
whether  such  mistakes  ever  happen  among  them; 
but  that  such  egregious  mistakes  do  occur  among 
parents  all  the  time,  I  am  sure.  There  are  many 
parents  who  never  stop  to  ask  before  they  pun- 
ish— that  is,  before  they  prescribe  their  moral 
remedies — what  the  nature  of  the  disease  is  with 
which  their  child  is  afflicted.  They  never  take  the 
trouble  to  make  a  diagnosis  of  the  case  in  order 
to  treat  it  correctly.  There  is  perhaps  not  one 
parent  in  a  thousand  who  has  a  clear  idea  of  the 
character  of  his  child,  or  to  whom  it  even  so  much 
as  occurs  that  he  ought  to  have  a  clear  conception 
of  that  character,  a  map  of  it,  a  chart  of  it,  laid 
out,  as  it  were,  in  his  mind.  The  trouble  is  that 
attention  is  not  usually  called  to  this  important 
matter,  and  I  purpose  to  make  it  the  special  sub- 
ject of  this  address. 

i.  OBSTINACY 

I  am  prepared  at  the  outset  for  the  objection 
that  the  case  against  parents  has  been  overstated. 
There  are  parents  who  freely  acknowledge,  "My 
child  is  obstinate;  I  know  it  has  an  obstinate  char- 
acter." Others  say,  "My  child,  alas!  is  untruth- 
ful." Others  again  declare,  "My  child  is  indolent." 

But  these  symptoms  are  far  too  indeterminate 
to  base  upon  them  a  correct  reformatory  treat- 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN     29 

merit.  Such  symptoms  may  be  due  to  a  variety 
of  causes,  and  not  until  we  have  discovered  the 
underlying  cause  in  any  given  case  can  we  be  sure 
that  we  are  following  the  right  method. 

Take  the  case,  for  instance,  of  obstinacy;  a  child 
is  told  to  do  a  certain  thing  and  it  refuses.  Now, 
here  is  a  dilemma.  How  shall  we  act?  There  are 
those  who  say:  In  such  cases  a  child  must  be  chas- 
tised until  it  does  what  it  is  told.  A  gentleman 
who  was  present  here  last  Sunday  had  the  kindness 
to  send  me  during  the  week  an  edition  of  John 
Wesley's  sermons,  and  in  this  volume,  in  the  ser- 
mon on  "Obedience  to  Parents,"  I  read  the  follow- 
ing words:  "Break  the  will  if  you  would  not  damn 
the  child.  I  conjure  you  not  to  neglect,  not  to 
delay  this!  Therefore  (i)  Let  a  child  from  a  year 
old  be  taught  to  fear  the  rod  and  to  cry  softly. 
In  order  to  do  this  (2)  Let  him  have  nothing  he 
cries  for,  absolutely  nothing,  great  or  small,  else 
you  undo  your  own  work.  At  all  events,  from  that 
age  make  him  do  as  he  is  bid,  if  you  whip  him 
ten  times  running  to  effect  it.  Let  none  persuade 
you  it  is  cruelty  to  do  this:  it  is  cruelty  not  to  do  it. 
Break  his  will  now,  and  his  soul  will  live,  and  he 
will  probably  bless  you  to  all  eternity." 

But  by  following  this  line  of  treatment  we  may 
obtain  a  result  the  very  opposite  of  that  which 
we  intended.  Obstinacy  in  many  cases  is  due  to 
sensitiveness.  There  are  some  children  as  sensitive 
to  impressions  as  is  that  well-known  flower  which 
closes  its  quivering  leaves  at  the  slightest  touch. 
These  sensitive  children  retreat  into  themselves 
at  the  first  sign  of  unfriendliness  or  aggression  from 
without.  The  reason  why  such  a  child  does  not 
obey  its  father's  command  is  not,  perhaps,  because 
it  is  unwilling  to  do  as  it  is  told,  but  because  of  the 
stern  face,  the  impatient  gesture,  the  raised  voice 
with  which  the  parent  accompanies  the  command, 
and  which  jars  upon  the  child's  feelings. 

If  such  a  parent,  incensed  at  the  child's  dis- 
obedience, becomes  still  more  severe,  raises  his 


30     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

voice  still  more,  he  will  only  make  matters  worse. 
The  child  will  shrink  from  him  still  more  and  con- 
tinue its  passive  resistance.  In  this  manner  ob- 
stinacy, which  was  at  first  only  a  passing  spell, 
may  become  a  fixed  trait  in  the  child's  character. 

To  be  sure,  we  should  not,  on  the  other  hand, 
treat  these  sensitive  children  only  with  caresses. 
In  this  way  we  encourage  their  sensitiveness, 
whereas  we  should  regard  it  as  a  weakness  that 
requires  to  be  gradually  but  steadily  overcome. 

The  middle  way  seems  the  best.  Let  the  parent 
exact  obedience  from  the  child  by  gentle  firmness, 
by  a  firmness  in  which  there  shall  be  no  trace  of 
passion,  no  heightened  feeling,  and  with  a  gentle- 
ness which,  gentle  as  it  may  be,  shall  be  at  the  same 
time  unyielding.  But  while  obstinacy  is  some- 
times due  to  softness  of  nature,  it  is  at  other  times 
due  to  the  opposite — to  hardness  of  nature,  and 
according  to  the  case  we  should  vary  our  treatment. 

There  are  persons  who,  having  once  made  up 
their  minds  to  do  a  thing,  cannot  be  moved  from 
their  resolution  by  any  amount  of  persuasion. 
These  hard  natures,  these  concentrated  wills,  are 
bound  to  have  their  way,  no  matter  whom  they 
injure,  no  matter  what  stands  in  the  way.  Such 
persons — and  we  notice  the  beginnings  of  this  trait 
in  children — need  to  be  taught  to  respect  the  rights 
of  others.  Their  wills  should  occasionally  be  al- 
lowed to  collide  with  the  wills  of  others,  in  order 
that  they  may  discover  that  there  are  other  wills 
limiting  theirs,  and  may  learn  the  necessary  lesson 
of  submission. 

In  yet  other  cases  obstinacy  is  due  to  stupidity. 
Persons  of  weak  intelligence  are  apt  to  be  sus- 
picious. Not  understanding  the  motives  of  others, 
they  distrust  them;  unwilling  to  follow  the  guidance 
of  others,  they  cling  with  a  sort  of  desperation  to 
their  own  purpose.  These  cases  may  be  treated 
by  removing  the  cause  of  suspicion,  by  patiently 
explaining  one's  motives  where  it  is  possible  to 
do  so,  by  awakening  confidence. 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN     31 
2.  UNTRUTHFULNESS 

Again,  let  us  take  the  fault  of  untruthfulness. 
One  cannot  sufficiently  commend  the  watchfulness 
of  those  parents  who  take  alarm  at  the  slightest 
sign  of  falsehood  in  a  child.  A  lie  should  always 
put  us  on  our  guard.  The  arch  fiend  is  justly 
called  "the  father  of  lies."  The  habit  of  falsehood, 
when  it  has  become  settled,  is  the  sure  inlet  to 
worse  vices. 

At  the  same  time  not  all  falsehoods  are  equally 
culpable  or  equally  indicative  of  evil  tendency, 
and  we  should  have  a  care  to  discriminate  between 
the  different  causes  of  falsehood  in  the  young 
child,  in  order  that  we  may  pursue  the  proper 
treatment.  Sometimes  falsehood  is  due  to  re- 
dundant imagination,  especially  in  young  children 
who  have  not  yet  learned  to  distinguish  between 
fact  and  fancy.  In  such  cases  we  may  restrain 
the  child's  imagination  by  directing  its  attention 
to  the  world  of  fact,  by  trying  to  interest  it  in 
natural  history  and  the  like. 

We  should  especially  set  the  example  of  strict 
accuracy  ourselves  in  all  our  statements,  no  matter 
how  unimportant  they  may  be.  For  instance,  if 
we  narrate  certain  occurrences  in  the  presence  of 
the  child,  we  should  be  careful  to  observe  the  exact 
order  in  which  the  events  occurred,  and  if  we  have 
made  a  mistake  we  should  take  pains  to  correct 
ourselves,  though  the  order  of  occurrence  is  really 
immaterial.  Precisely  because  it  is  immaterial  we 
show  by  this  means  how  much  we  value  accuracy 
even  in  little  things. 

Then,  again,  falsehood  is  often  due  to  the  desire 
for  gain.  Or  it  may  be  due  to  fear.  The  child  is 
afraid  of  the  severity  of  the  parent's  discipline. 
In  that  case  we  are  to  blame;  we  must  relax  our 
discipline.  We  have  no  business  to  tempt  the  child 
into  falsehood.  Again,  untruthfulness  is  often  due 
to  mistaken  sympathy,  as  we  see  in  the  case  of 
pupils  in  school,  who  will  tell  a  falsehood  to  shield 


32     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

a   fellow   pupil.      In   the  worst   cases   falsehood   is 
inspired  by  malice. 

It  may  be  said  that  the  proper  positive  treat- 
ment for  this  fault  is  to  set  the  example  of  the 
strictest  truthfulness  ourselves,  to  avoid  the  little 
falsehoods  which  we  sometimes  allow  ourselves 
without  compunction,  to  show  our  disgust  at  a  lie, 
to  fill  the  child  with  a  sense  of  the  baseness  of 
lying,  and  above  all  to  find  out  the  direct  cause 
which  has  tempted  the  child  in  any  given  case. 
As  a  rule,  falsehood  is  only  a  means  to  an  end; 
children  do  not  tell  untruths  because  they  like 
to  tell  them,  but  because  they  have  some  ulterior 
end  in  view.  Find  out  what  that  ulterior  end  is, 
and  instead  of  directing  your  attention  only  to 
the  lie,  penetrate  to  the  motive  that  has  led  the 
child  into  falsehood,  and  try  to  divert  it  from  the 
bad  end.  Thus  you  may  extract  the  cause  of  its 
wrongdoing. 


3.  LAZINESS 


Thirdly,  let  us  consider  the  fault  of  laziness. 
Laziness  is  sometimes  due  to  physical  causes. 
Nothing  may  be  necessary  but  a  change  of  diet, 
exercise  in  the  fresh  air,  etc.,  to  cure  the  evil.  Some- 
times it  is  the  sign  of  a  certain  slow  growth  of  the 
mind.  There  are  fruits  in  the  garden  of  the  gods 
that  ripen  slowly,  and  these  fruits  are  often  not 
the  least  precious  or  the  least  beautiful  when  they 
finally  have  matured.  Sir  Isaac  Newton's  mind 
was  one  of  these  slowly  ripening  fruits.  In  school 
he  was  regarded  as  a  dullard  and  his  teachers  had 
small  hopes  of  him. 

Laziness,    like   other    faults    of   character,    some- 
times  disappears   in   the   process   of  growth.     Just 
as  at  a  certain  period  in  the  life  of  a  youth  or  maidei 
new  faculties  seem  to  develop,  new  passions  arise,  I 
a  new  life  begins  to  stir  in  the  heart,  so  at  a  certain] 
period    qualities    with    which    we    had    long    been; 
familiar,  disappear  of  themselves. 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN     33 

We  have  very  little  light  upon  this  subject,  but 
the  fact  that  a  great  transformation  of  character 
sometimes  does  take  place  in  children  without  any 
perceptible  cause  is  quite  certain,  and  it  may  be 
offered  as  a  comforting  reflection  to  those  parents 
who  are  over-anxious  on  account  of  the  faults 
they  detect  in  their  children.  But  again,  on  the 
other  hand,  laziness  or  untruthfulness  or  obstinacy 
may  be  a  black  streak,  coming  to  the  surface  out 
of  the  nethermost  strata  of  moral  depravity,  and, 
taken  in  connection  with  other  traits,  may  justify 
the  most  serious  apprehension,  and  should  then 
be  a  signal  for  immediate  measures  of  the  most 
stringent  sort. 

4.  DISCOVERING  CAUSES 

I  am  thus  led  to  the  second  branch  of  my  sub- 
ject. I  have  tried  to  meet  the  objection  of  the 
parent  who  says,  "I  know  the  character  of  my 
child;  I  know  my  child  is  obstinate,"  by  replying, 
"If  you  only  know  that  your  child  is  obstinate 
you  know  very  little;  you  need  to  know  what  are 
the  causes  of  his  obstinacy,  and  vary  your  treat- 
ment accordingly."  Or  if  any  one  says,  "My  child 
is  untruthful,"  I  reply,  "You  need  to  find  out 
what  the  cause  is  of  this  untruthfulness  and  vary 
your  treatment  accordingly."  Or  again,  in  the  case 
which  we  have  just  considered,  I  have  pointed  out 
that  laziness  in  a  child  may  have  no  serious  mean- 
ing whatever  or  may  give  just  cause  for  the  most 
serious  alarm,  according  to  the  group  of  charac- 
teristic traits  of  which  it  is  one.  On  this  point  I 
wish  to  lay  stress.  If  you  desire  to  obtain  a  correct 
impression  of  a  human  face,  you  do  not  look  at 
the  eye  by  itself,  then  at  the  nose,  then  fix  your 
attention  on  the  cheeks  and  the  chin  and  the  brow, 
but  you  regard  all  these  features  together  and 
view  them  in  their  relations  to  one  another.  Or 
let  us  recur  to  the  simile  of  the  physician.  What 
would  you  think  of  the  doctor  who  should  judge 


34     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

the  nature  of  a  disease  by  some  one  symptom 
which  happened  to  obtrude  itself,  or  should  treat 
each  symptom  as  it  appears  separately,  without 
endeavoring  to  reach  the  occult  cause  which  has 
given  rise  to  the  symptoms,  of  which  they  are  all 
but  the  outward  manifestation? 

And  yet  that  is  precisely  the  incredible  mistake 
which  every  one  of  us,  I  venture  to  say,  is  apt  to 
make  in  the  treatment  of  children's  characters. 
We  judge  of  them  by  some  one  trait,  as  obstinacy, 
which  happens  to  obtrude  itself  on  our  attention, 
and  we  prescribe  for  each  symptom  as  it  arises; 
we  treat  obstinacy  by  itself,  and  untruthfulness 
and  indolence  separately,  without  endeavoring  to 
get  at  the  underlying  cause  of  all  these  symptoms. 
The  point  I  desire  to  make  is  that  in  the  education 
of  our  children  it  is  necessary  not  only  to  study 
individual  traits,  but  each  trait  in  connection  with 
the  group  to  which  it  belongs. 

Take  for  an  illustration  the  case  last  mentioned 
—that  of  laziness.  There  is  a  well-known  type 
group  or  group  of  characteristic  traits,  of  which 
laziness  is  one.  The  chief  components  of  this 
group  are  the  following:  The  sense  of  shame  is 
wanting,  that  is  one  trait.  The  will  is  under  the 
control  of  random  impulses,  good  impulses  mingle 
helter-skelter  with  bad.  There  is  an  indisposition 
on  the  part  of  such  a  child  to  prolonged  exertion 
in  any  direction,  even  in  the  direction  of  pleasure. 
That  is  perhaps  the  most  dangerous  trait  of  all. 

If  you  try  to  deal,  as  people  actually  do,  with 
each  of  these  traits  separately,  you  will  fail.  If 
you  try  to  influence  the  sense  of  shame,  you  will 
meet  with  no  response;  if  you  disgrace  such  a  child, 
you  will  make  it  worse;  if  you  whip  it,  you  will 
harden  it.  If  you  attempt  to  overcome  indolence 
by  the  promise  of  rewards,  that  will  be  useless. 
The  child  forgets  promised  rewards  just  as  quickly 
as  it  forgets  threatened  punishment. 

This  forgetfulness,  this  lack  of  coherency  in 
ideas,  is  particularly  characteristic.     The  ideas  oi 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN     35 

such  a  child  are  imperfectly  connected.  The  ties 
between  causes  and  their  effects  are  feeble.  The 
contents  of  the  child's  mind  are  in  a  state  of  un- 
stable equilibrium.  There  is  no  point  of  fixity  in 
its  mental  realm.  And  the  cure  for  such  a  condi- 
tion is  to  establish  fixity  in  the  thoughts,  to  induce 
habits  of  industry  and  application  by  steady,  unre- 
laxing  discipline,  and  especially  by  means  of  manual 
training. 

The  immense  value  of  mechanical  labor  as  a 
means  of  moral  improvement  has  been  appreciated 
until  now  only  to  a  very  imperfect  extent.  Mechan- 
ical labor  wisely  directed  secures  mental  fixity  be- 
cause it  concentrates  the  child's  attention  for  days 
and  often  for  weeks  upon  a  single  task.  Mechanical 
labor  stimulates  moral  pride  by  enabling  the  pupil 
to  produce  articles  of  value  and  giving  him  in  this 
way  the  sense  of  achievement.  Mechanical  labor 
also  overcomes  indolence  by  compelling  settled 
habits  of  industry,  whereby  the  random  impulses 
of  the  will  are  brought  under  control. 

The  type  group  which  we  have  just  considered 
is  one  of  the  most  clearly  marked  and  easily  recog- 
nized. It  is  a  type  which  we  often  meet  with  among 
the  so-called  criminal  classes,  where  its  character- 
istic features  can  be  seen  in  exaggerated  propor- 
tions. Without  attempting  to  analyze  any  additional 
types  (a  task  of  great  delicacy  and  difficulty),  the 
truth  that  the  underlying  fault  of  character  is  often 
unlike  the  symptoms  which  appear  most  conspicu- 
ously on  the  surface  may  be  further  illustrated  by 
the  following  example.  I  have  known  of  a  person 
who  made  himself  obnoxious  to  his  friends  by  his 
overbearing  manners  and  apparent  arrogance.  Cas- 
ual observers  condemned  him  on  account  of  what 
they  believed  to  be  his  overweening  self-confidence, 
and  expressed  the  opinion  that  his  self-conceit  ought 
to  be  broken  down.  But  the  real  trouble  with  him 
was  not  that  he  was  too  self-confident,  but  that 
he  had  not  self-confidence  enough.  His  self-con- 
fidence needed  to  be  built  up.  He  was  overbearing 


36     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

in  society  because  he  did  not  trust  himself,  becau* 
he  was  always  afraid  of  not  being  able  to  hold  his 
own,  and  hence  he  exaggerated  on  the  other  side. 
Those  who  take  such  a  person  to  be  in  reality  what 
he  seems  to  be  will  never  be  able  to  influence  him. 
If  we  find  such  a  trait  in  a  child,  and  simply  treat 
it  as  if  it  were  arrogant,  we  shall  miss  the  mark 
entirely.  We  must  find  the  underlying  principle 
of  the  character  the  occult  cause  of  which  the 
surface  symptoms  are  the  effects. 

Our  knowledge  of  the  great  type  groups  is  as  yet 
extremely  meager.  Psychology  has  yet  to  do  its 
work  in  this  direction,  and  books  on  education 
give  us  but  little  help.  But  there  are  certain 
means  by  which  the  task  of  investigation  may  possi- 
bly be  assisted.  One  means  is  the  study  of  the 
plays  of  Shakespeare.  That  master  mind  has 
created  certain  types  of  character  which  repay 
the  closest  analysis.  The  study  of  the  best  biog- 
raphies is  a  second  means.  The  study  of  the  moral 
characteristics  of  the  primitive  races — a  study  which 
has  been  begun  by  Herbert  Spencer  in  his  work 
on  Descriptive  Sociology,  and  by  Waitz  in  his 
Anthropologie  der  Naturvolker — is  perhaps  another 
means;  and  honest  introspection,  when  it  shall  have 
become  the  rule  among  intelligent  persons,  instead  of 
being  the  exception,  will  probably  be  the  best  means. 

I  am  afraid  that  some  of  my  hearers,  from  having 
been  over-confident  as  educators  in  the  beginning, 
may  now  have  become  over-timid;  from  having 
said  to  themselves,  "Why,  of  course  we  know  the 
characteristics  of  our  children,"  may  now,  since  the 
difficulties  of  studying  character  have  been  explained, 
be  disposed  to  exclaim  in  a  kind  of  despair,  "Who 
can  ever  understand  the  character  of  a  single  human 
being?"  A  perfect  understanding  of  any  human 
being  is  indeed  impossible.  We  do  not  perfectly 
know  even  those  who  are  nearest  and  dearest  to 
us.  But  there  are  means  of  reaching  at  least  approx- 
imate results,  so  far  as  children  are  concerned,  and 
a  few  of  these  permit  me  to  briefly  summarize. 


THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN     37 

Try  to  win  the  confidence  of  the  child  so  that 
it  may  disclose  its  inner  life  to  you.  Children 
accept  the  benefactions  of  their  parents  as  un- 
thinkingly as  they  breathe  the  air  around  them. 
Show  them  that  your  care  and  untiring  devotion 
must  be  deserved,  not  taken  as  a  matter  of  course. 
In  this  way  you  will  deepen  their  attachment  and 
lead  them  to  willingly  open  their  hearts  to  you. 
At  the  same  time  enter  into  the  lesser  concerns  of 
their  life.  Be  their  comrades,  their  counselors; 
stoop  to  them,  let  them  cling  to  you. 

Observe  your  children  when  they  are  at  play, 
for  it  is  then  that  they  throw  off  their  reserve  and 
show  themselves  as  they  are.  Some  children,  for 
instance,  will  not  join  a  game  unless  they  can  be 
leaders;  is  not  that  a  sign  of  character?  Some  chil- 
dren will  take  an  unfair  advantage  at  play,  and 
justify  themselves  by  saying,  "It  is  only  in  play." 
Some  are  persistent  in  a  game  while  others  tire  of 
any  game  after  a  little  while.  Others  are  sticklers 
for  a  strict  observance  of  the  rules.  Observe  how 
your  sons  or  daughters  are  regarded  by  their  com- 
panions; children  are  often  wonderfully  quick  to 
detect  one  another's  faults. 

Try  to  find  out  what  the  favorite  pursuits  and 
studies  of  your  child  are,  by  what  it  is  repelled,  by 
what  attracted,  and  to  what  it  is  indifferent.  Above 
all,  keep  a  record  of  your  child's  development. 
Do  not  shun  the  labor  involved  in  this.  You  know 
very  well  that  nothing  worth  having  can  be  ob- 
tained without  labor,  yet  most  parents  are  un- 
willing to  give  sufficient  time  and  attention  to  the 
education  of  their  children.  Keep  a  record  of  the 
most  significant  words  and  acts  of  the  child.  Thus 
after  a  while  you  may  have  a  picture  of  the  child's 
inward  condition  before  you,  an  assemblage  of 
characteristic  traits,  and  by  comparing  one  trait 
with  another,  you  may  find  the  clue  to  a  deeper 
understanding  of  its  nature. 

What  I  have  said  about  children  applies  equally 
to  ourselves.  I  started  out  by  saying  that  not 


38     THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

one  parent  in  a  thousand  knows  his  child's  character. 
I  conclude  by  saying  that  not  one  man  or  woman 
in  a  thousand  knows  his  or  her  own  character. 
We  go  through  life  cherishing  an  unreal  conception 
of  ourselves  which  is  often  inspired  by  vanity. 

I  am  well  aware  that  it  is  difficult  to  know  oneself, 
but  there  are  helps  in  this  direction  also.  We  can 
look  over  our  own  past  record,  we  can  honestly 
examine  how  we  have  acted  in  the  leading  crises 
of  our  lives,  we  can  summon  our  own  character- 
istic traits  before  our  minds — the  things  that  we 
like  to  dwell  upon,  and  the  things  which  we  would 
gladly  blot  out  of  our  memories  if  we  could— and 
by  comparing  this  trait  with  that,  we  may  dis- 
cover the  springs  by  which  we  have  been  moved. 
It  is  difficult  to  attain  self-knowledge,  but  it  is 
imperative  that  we  should  try  to  attain  it.  The 
aim  of  our  existence  is  to  improve  our  characters, 
and  clearly  we  cannot  improve  them  unless  we 
know  them. 

I  have  undertaken  to  grapple  with  a  most  difficult 
subject,  but  I  shall  have  accomplished  the  purpose 
which  I  had  in  mind  if  I  have  awakened  in  you  a 
deeper  desire  to  ask  yourselves,  first,  "What  is  the 
character  of  my  child  ?"  and,  second,  "What  is 
my  own  character?"  The  most  serious  business 
of  our  lives  is  to  try  to  find  the  answers  to  these 
two  questions. 


THE  AMERICAN   HOME  SERIES 

NORMAN  E.  RICHARDSON,  Editor 


1.  THE  NATION'S  CHALLENGE  TO  THE  HOME 

2.  How  ONE  REAL  MOTHER  LIVES  WITH  HER  CHILDREN 

3.  PARENTHOOD  AND  HEREDITY 

4.  THE  ROOTS  OF  DISPOSITION  AND  CHARACTER 

5.  THE  FIRST  YEAR  IN  A  BABY'S  LIFE 

6.  THUMB-SUCKING 

7.  THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  BABY  UNTIL  IT  Is  ONE  YEAR  OLD 

8.  FIRST  STEPS  TOWARD  CHARACTER 

9.  THE  SECOND  AND  THIRD  YEARS 

10.  THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  CHILD  DURING  THE  SECOND  AND 

THIRD  YEARS 

11.  THE  MOTHER  AS  PLAYFELLOW  (YEARS  ONE,  Two,  AND 

THREE) 

12.  THE  PROBLEMS  OF  TEMPER 

13.  THE  PROBLEMS  OF  FIGHTING 

14.  THE  GOVERNMENT  OF  YOUNG  CHILDREN 

15.  THE  PUNISHMENT  OF  CHILDREN 

16.  THE  HOME  KINDERGARTEN 

THE  RELIGIOUS  NURTURE  OF  A  LITTLE  CHILD  (YEARS 

FOUR  AND  FIVE) 
THE  NERVOUS  CHILD 

)N  TRUTH  TELLING  AND  THE  PROBLEM  OF  CHILDREN'S 
|   LIES 
]THE    GOVERNMENT    OF    CHILDREN    BETWEEN    Six    AND 

TWELVE 

THE  DRAMATIC  INSTINCT  IN  CHILDREN 
DRAMATICS  IN  THE  HOME 
TABLE  TALK  IN  THE  HOME 
SUNDAY  IN  THE  HOME 
A.  YEAR  OF  GOOD  SUNDAYS 
THE  PICTURE-HOUR  IN  THE  HOME 
STORY-TELLING  IN  THE  HOME 
vlusic  IN  THE  HOME 
TRAINING  IN  THRIFT 
;<WHAT  TO    SAY"  IN   TELLING   THE    STORY   OF   LIFE'S 

RENEWAL 

}EX  DISCIPLINE  FOR  BOYS  IN  THE  HOME 
YOUTH'S  OUTLOOK  UPON  LIFE 
BUILDING  FOR  WOMANHOOD 
RHYTHM  AND  RECREATION 
THE  HOME  AND  MOVING  PICTURES. 
WORSHIP  IN  THE  HOME. 
(THE  USE  OF  DOLLS  IN  CHILD-TRAINING. 

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